Contract Closure
by Chronic Guardian
Summary: [Post Canon] Rico held up her end of things. Maybe that was why he had to be there for her now, even if he didn't have a clue in the world what difference it would make. For my mentors. [Shibuya Operation Story Storm]
1. Prologue: Covalence

**-Contract Closure-**  
By Chronic Guardian

**-For TaerKitty, Prince of the Pithy and Champion of the Concise, and TheScarredMan, Rico's Real Guardian. Thank you both for everything-**

**Prologue: Covalence**

Winter winds ghosted over gold-laced morning waves outside the porthole. A misty outline of Italy's west coast hovered across the east horizon. Not a town Claes recognized, but given their last port in Elba she placed it somewhere between Tuscany and Liguria. A little longer and they would be stopping over at the naval port in La Spezia.

Not quite a year at sea and this was their first true return to the mainland.

No missions waiting for them, no Padania. They had completed their purpose in the eyes of the government, now they just watched and waited.

Settling back into her chair, Claes retrieved her reading material for the day then sat for a moment with the cover closed. It was an open secret they were waiting for a "natural retirement". Some of the Gen Twos talked about staying sharp for their next assignment, but they all knew what was coming. Claes just had the courage to actually articulate it. While the others were only just now coming around to the idea that they were dying, Claes had already made up her mind not to worry too much.

Not until she had to, anyway. She went about reading and painting and practicing the piano, just as she had when Angelica made her last contributions to their medical literature. It wasn't combat that would kill them at this point, it was the conditioning. The drugs that kept their cybernetic implants working also ate at their brain tissue, starving off the sections related to motor control and eventually hampering memory formation and retention. Given how far along they were, the only real way to fight that now would be to stop taking it altogether.

Unfortunately, that would also mean surrendering the use of one's body.

Claes squared her shoulders and parted the pages to a pressed chrysanthemum keeping her place. They would either die in delusion or live a little longer as implant rejection set in. Framed in those terms, a functioning death on the battlefield seemed like a mercy.

The time for that choice ended with the Padania, however. The best they could do now was make sense of their remaining options and die on their own terms.

Folding her hands under her chin, Claes found her place on the page and began reading.

Or rather, tried to. She paused as the door behind her unceremoniously belched with banging knuckles, then creaked open.

"Hey, Claes?" A Gen Two girl with shaggy dark hair—Gattonero, if Claes was remembering it right—poked her head into the cabin and addressed her with a light frown. "Bergonzi wants you."

Claes raised an eyebrow.

"Look, just hurry up," Gattonero muttered, glancing to the side. "He said he wants to talk before the Terminator gets back from shore leave."

"You mean Jean."

Most of the Second Generation didn't particularly care for the head of the Handlers. Not to say the Gen Ones like Claes felt the opposite, of course, but professional courtesy had been more of a standard back when ex-military types filled the Handler roster.

"Okay, fine, _sad_ Terminator," the older girl allowed with a huff. "What's his deal these days, anyway? You think he got bored babysitting us?"

Claes took a breath of bracing patience. "Probably legal work." Even with the Padania gone, Jean Croce was a man of action. Whatever had taken him away from the ship, she suspected it was something more pressing than watching them die.

"Bet he's doing mop up missions behind our backs," Gattonero went on, "Hell, that's what _I'd_ be doing if I weren't stuck here."

Claes gave her fellow cyborg an evaluating frown. Not likely, considering the Pisano administration was trying to move away from violent solutions, but logic didn't seem particularly relevant to the argument. "You think he would do that without his cyborg?" she offered instead, taking a moment to set her desk in order before heading for the door.

"Rico?" Gattonero rolled her eyes. "If he brought her, he'd have to hold her hand the whole mission." With Claes almost to the door, the Gen Two girl backed off and braced her hands on the frame, forming a human arch for Claes to pass under. "That girl has the worst sense of direction like, _ever_."

"Oh?" Claes ducked under the arms and moved on. She posed the question more as a matter of etiquette than anything else. Complaining about Gen Ones' shortcomings was just something the Gen Twos did, more so now that they didn't have anything better to do.

"I mean, we've been here for like a year already," Gattonero muttered, flanking Claes as they started off down the hall. "You'd think she'd know which room is hers by now. I mean, she seemed like she got it for the first part of the year. You think she's trolling me?"

Claes gave the older girl a sharp glance. "...When did this start?"

"Just like…" Gattonero grimaced and scrubbed at the back of her head, ruffling her dark mop like a bird trying to dry its feathers. "I dunno, start of last week? Why?"

Claes adjusted her glasses and resumed as if nothing had happened. "Bergonzi might want to know." Two weeks… now that she thought about it, she hadn't been running into Rico as much around the ship. How long had Jean been gone before that? It seemed about a month now...

"Naw, I already told him," Gattonero said, waving the suggestion off. Then, after a beat, "you think that's what he wants to talk about?"

"I think he's going to ask about my reading," Claes answered evenly.

"Yeah? You going through his reports for him or something?"

"Belisario's, actually."

"Beli—? Oh, Doc Cue Ball," Gattonero nodded. "The guy in charge of conditioning, right?"

"Yes."

"Yeah, bleh, that guy gave me the creeps. Is Bergonzi taking that over for him? I hope so."

Claes set her eyes forward as a chill tickled at the base of her neck. "We're looking at the terminal stages of a Gen One's life cycle," she said. "Belisario compared them to rapid-onset dementia."

Gattonero slowed to a stop. Claes kept moving until the older girl spoke up again.

"Well… yeah, good luck with that, then."

"Thank you." It wasn't much, but it was about what she would expect. The Gen Twos had lighter conditioning; they still thought like regular teenage girls when left to their own devices. With the conditioning they _did_ have going through their brains, though, death was a subject purposefully kept away from continuous scrutiny. As government assassins, Belisario had conditioned them to face death, not live with it. The sooner it was out of sight, the better.

"H-hey, Claes?"

Claes glanced over her shoulder. "Yes?"

Gattonero fidgeted with her fingers a moment before closing her hand in a firm fist. "_You_ can still get to Bergonzi's office on your own… right?"

Claes gave the older girl a quiet, assuring smile. "Don't worry. I'm alright."

For a second, Gattonero stared with customary Gen Two discontent: too dull to count as contrary, too engaged to be satisfied. She opened her mouth, a question almost forming, before closing it again and turning to leave.

Letting out a long breath, Claes kept on her way.

Death would catch up with them eventually, but so long as it wasn't her yet she could always step back and deal with it later. Maybe by the time it started approaching the Gen Twos they would even be able to do something about it.

In the meantime, death had sunk its claws into one of their own, and the best they could do for her was hope it was merciful.

Beneath Claes, the ship groaned with a crashing wave, then sunk back into silence.


	2. Contract

**Contract**

"How long do we have?"

Jean asked the question while flashing his papers to a particularly insistent Ensign. The young man looked the documents over and scowled at him. Still, he stepped aside and waved Jean through all the same.

"_Maybe a month,_" Marco's voice came back garbled. "_Bianchi's giving her an assessment now._"

Jean could see the ship coming into harbor, tinted golden through his shades, but the weather wasn't cooperating with cell service. Most people would probably just give up and have the conversation in person at this point, but Jean was a man of principle with boxes to fill. Getting this little check-in with his shipside replacement out of the way now meant less work settling in later.

That said, he wasn't particularly enjoying what he was hearing.

"Bianchi said a year and a half when we started."

"_Well, Bergonzi says a month now, and Bianchi is backing him up until further notice. It looks like her body is trying to flush the conditioning, and that's causing a rapid onset. Doctors are guessing she missed her pills."_

Seagulls squawked overhead and Jean gave them a passing glance. The ship made berth ahead of him, striking an odd figure as the one civilian hull among the gathered patrol craft. Rico forgetting her conditioning pills was about as likely as his family rising up from their graves, not that arguing that point would do anything for them now. Jean was headed back for the ship. One month or six, he wouldn't be going anywhere else anytime soon.

"Anything else I should be aware of?" he muttered into the receiver.

"_… __Are you sure you want to come back?_"

Odd, but not entirely unexpected. All the surviving Handlers had gotten awfully reflective in the fallout of their last mission. Marco was no exception.

Perhaps that was why Jean hardened. Somebody had to be taking this with a clear head.

"It's not exactly what I signed on for, but it comes with the territory."

Marco replied with a fuzzy sigh. "_Look, Jean, I know I don't have the most leeway asking this..." _The line petered out into a couple seconds of radio silence as dockhands filled the space.

"Spit it out, Marco."

_"__...How much do you really care about Rico?"_

Jean narrowed his eyes at a couple of dockhands securing a gangplank ahead of him. "She's my responsibility." It was a stupid question. He was half-tempted to just hang up now and finish up in person.

Not like this conversation was going anywhere...

"_You won't be able to do much at this point."_

"I'm still coming."

"_Just… making sure you know what you're getting into._"

Jean found a spot to wait for boarding fixtures and settled into an "at ease" posture. "I've lived through worse." Figures were starting to appear on deck. No Rico just yet, mostly Second Gens and their Handlers getting ready to help with resupply.

"_That's not what I mean. You're going to be watching her die, Jean._"

"I'm coming aboard in a minute. I'll get the notes from Bergonzi."

"_Bergonzi hasn't lost a cyborg."_

"Well, if you have any suggestions, you can always leave them with him."

_"__Hmph…" _Marco grunted. He didn't sound particularly convinced, but Jean had never lived his life on opinions._ "Fine._ _Just don't..._"

The connection wheezed like a curling wave. Jean held position and waited for it to blow over. When the static cleared to a dial tone he quietly closed the call and slipped the phone back into his pocket.

From where he stood, the skies didn't look bad enough to break the connection. Maybe it was a problem with his phone. One of the clerical workers running the department transfer had been pestering him for an upgrade. Once things settled down, he'd put in the time and take the leap forward.

Either way, it was better things ended there. Whatever Marco wanted to say, it wasn't going to change their situation. Not what was happening to Rico, and not what Jean could do about it. He tilted his head back and checked the deck again.

A familiar blonde had bobbed to the front of the crowd, two heads shorter than the average. He watched as she levered herself up on the railing and scanned the docks with bright eyes built for sniping. Behind her, Marco's broader adult form shouldered its way through the assembled Gen Twos so he could get a hand on her.

Before he could, she locked eyes with Jean. Her face broke into a grin and she gave him a full-armed wave, like a lost child flagging down her parent.

Jean just looked back to the secured boarding plank and moved forward as the dockhands retreated. Even under the overcast sky, Rico still looked full of life. Hard to believe she was the same girl he'd been discussing with Marco a second ago.

Of course, the problem wasn't necessarily with her body just yet, it was with her living tissue, her _brain_. She would probably become bed ridden towards the end; Conditioning was only designed to compensate for so much in the way of motor control. Until then, her cybernetic limbs would work just fine. That was her reward for trusting him, for serving the Agency.

She probably would've wanted it that way. Rico spent the first ten years of her life in a hospital bed. The modern medical miracle of giving a working body to a quadriplegic was basically her reason to live. Jean faintly recalled the first few days of her training, coming to realize how much it meant to her. He'd expected some gratitude; that was part of why he asked for a light enough conditioning dose to keep her memory functioning. What he'd gotten was the key to her existence.

_If I do a good job, do I get to keep this body?_

Ahead of him, Rico still waved with one arm, hugging the railing to her stomach with the other. Marco finally got a hold and tried to pry her off, upsetting their combined balance as Rico slipped down and caught her chin on the metal bar.

Coming within non-shouting distance, Jean finally addressed his charge.

"Rico."

She anchored herself, staring at Jean while Marco rose back to his feet and dusted himself off.

"Get off the railing," he ordered quietly.

Rico paused a beat, as if wanting to say something else, before extricating herself from from the bars. By the time Jean finished boarding, she had settled back on the deck. The gathered Second Gens between them silently cleared the way, one or two throwing shrewd looks while they were at it.

Jean paid them no mind. He hadn't really bothered building more than a professional relationship with most of his colleagues, much less their cyborgs. If they wanted to waste time with petty shows of disapproval, that was up to them.

Rico, though… Rico stood at attention like he had taught her. Despite her at times uncouth enthusiasm, at least she wasn't struggling through teenage existential self-definition.

That was part of why he hadn't upgraded when the Second Gens came around. Doctor Bergonzi, lead researcher for cybernetic development and testing, had made an offer at the time. With Handlers in demand and the Second Gens working off a lighter conditioning load, the proposed trade was to use Rico as a lab rat while Jean walked away with an upgrade. Jean had almost half considered the idea until he saw the new standard age range and associated attitudes.

Part of him wondered now what Rico would have thought of the idea. A continuously improving body she was _meant_ to push to its limits… All she would have to do to keep it was to be herself. Sure, the baked-in fratello imprint stood in the way, but if the doctors could find a way around that with Claes when Raballo went down then surely they could do the same for Rico.

Unfortunately for them, Jean had never seen his relationship with the cybernetic division as a charity opportunity.

Standing behind Rico, arms crossed, Marco greeted him with a resigned expression two ticks north of a scowl. "Jean."

"Marco," he returned the curt greeting. They had both been career military men before joining the Agency, neither one much for pleasantries. "Thank you for keeping an eye on things. Alfonso has your keys, he'll meet you in the parking lot."

Marco grunted. "What, so I can get back to verifying reports for the Director?"

"They're looking into relocating some of our facilities," Jean explained, resting his hands in his pockets. "For records' sake, that includes our casualties. If you want to visit Angelica before then, now would be a good time."

Marco's relatively neutral expression darkened.

"If you would like a job in the field, though, I'm sure something can be arranged," Jean continued on. "The Director mentioned he was getting in contact with NOCS. As I recall, that was your original reason for joining us."

The other man glared. Not at Jean, just shoreward. "What's gotten into you, Jean?" he muttered. "Trying to clear out the bones in your closet?"

"Is there a problem?"

Marco glanced back, his mouth set in a hard line. Jean held his ground but internally prepared for a punch. It would be the stupidest thing in the world for Marco to do in front of Rico, but not entirely out of character. Jean would have to order her to stand down before instinct took over. She was already tensing in his peripheral...

Then, like a candle in the wind, Marco's anger flickered and faded.

"...Whatever."

Jean watched him go, joining the stream of bodies headed off the boat, before turning back towards the ship's bridge. Whatever was eating Marco, it wasn't his problem. He'd done his duty as a superior, as a colleague. Anything beyond that was beyond their contract.

Rico, however, was a different story.

"Come on," he said, setting off again. Bergonzi and the other doctors had set up their labs below the aft deck, probably to be close to the engine. Jean didn't actually know or care beyond how it related to Rico's medical briefing. So long as he had a destination, that was enough.

Behind him, Rico's footsteps took a moment longer than usual to follow his cue. A moment more and she was at his elbow.

"Um, sir?"

"What is it?"

"I… kind of lost Henrietta."

He kept his eyes ahead while he processed the statement. Not _what_ she was saying, of course. Henrietta hadn't made it out of their last big operation; there wasn't anything Rico could have done to stop that. It was the memory decay talking at this point. The bigger question was where that left them functionally.

"It's fine," he said after a beat. "Jose has her."

In the sense that Jean's brother had gone down with his cyborg, it was true enough. Burial arrangements had seen them separated.

"Oh." Rico took her own time to digest, allowing another hole to open up for the background shuffle of resupply to fill. Then, "Did they go on ahead?"

Jean felt something in his stomach stir. She couldn't mean it in a metaphorical sense; abstraction had never been her strong suit. How would she react if he just told her they were dead? She hadn't really cared when Angelica or Elsa went down. Henrietta and Jose should be no different.

"To the house, I mean. The one your family owns."

He stopped as he finally found his footing in her reconstructed reality. She was talking about the vacation house his parents left in Sicily. They'd gone there on leave once with Jose and Henrietta. Rico had technically arrived a day after Jean that time. Maybe her brain was matching the scenarios as a parallel.

"Yeah," he breathed, resuming his pace. He wouldn't get anywhere trying to psychoanalyze her on his own. "They went ahead."

Maybe they would visit Bianchi for a psychiatric exam after Bergonzi. Of course, like Marco said, it wouldn't actually change much. Even if they had temporarily stabilized her, she wouldn't be coming back any further than this. Still, it felt like the sort of thing he should do for her.

"Oh, that's good, then," Rico said. "Henrietta was really looking forward to spending time with him."

Probably wouldn't shut up about it, considering how Henrietta got about Jose. He had been her whole world. Thank God Rico wasn't like that.

"Hey, Jean?" she began again as they reached the door.

"What is it?"

"Did I do something else wrong?"

Jean gave her a measuring glance over his shoulder. If she didn't know what she was on about, then that meant they were both shooting in the dark.

"Why?"

"Well…" she fidgeted and her smile started to crack. "Nothing. Just... my body feels kinda funny."

This time he actually stopped and fully turned to face her. "...You're fine."

Her blue eyes locked with his as he said it. The concern there held for a moment, then dissolved back into her previous smile. Holding his gaze, she nodded.

The feeling in his stomach wormed up towards his heart as he remembered something she'd said during the De Sica investigation. At the time, he hadn't thought much of it. All he cared was that she did her job, and did it well.

_If Signore Jean says so, then it must be true_.

Turning back towards the ship's interior, he started off again to do what he could.

Behind him, Rico followed.


	3. Cavity

**Cavity**

Fluorescent lights bathed the ship's messhall in the dull, underworldly glow Jean associated with office work. To be fair, that was a step up from an interrogation room or surgical ward, but ultimately no substitute for natural light. It gave the pastoral jigsaw puzzle on the table a pale, wilted look and seemed to aggravate the empty yellows and pink veins in his skin.

Given his reading material, though, it was a fair enough fit.

Across from him, Rico dutifully shuffled through pieces looking for matches. Technically Bianchi had prescribed crosswords, but Rico's logical anchoring had never been strong in linguistics. After Jean spent an hour cajoling her through two lines, he gave up and moved to a jigsaw they found in one of the messhall cupboards.

Neither exercise seemed a particularly fitting use for a hundred million euro assassin, but Bianchi thought it might help slow the brain rot. More than binge watching daytime soaps like some of the Second Gens, anyway. Jean tried to believe it really did something as Rico hooked two pieces together, nodded her head to either side, then pulled them apart again. Still no match.

Rubbing a hand across his eyes, Jean sighed and looked away. Rain buzzed against the windows and waves rumbled through the hull. Nothing but storms ever since he came aboard. She'd made the best of it, she always did, but Jean could tell it was more so her optimism forming the smile than the activity. What she needed was sunlight and a good use for her body, and faded pictures of pastures she couldn't play in provided neither.

If only the ship had an indoor range…

He leaned back in his chair and considered the possibility. Between the doctors and shipboard engineering staff, there wasn't much chance of getting clearance to set anything substantial up. The most serious they could get would be role-play with rubbers or plastics, and there was only so much of that Jean could stomach before the juvenile facade just broke down. War wasn't a game.

He crossed his arms, returning back to the table where he'd put Claes' report. If anything significant could still be done, it was probably in there. From what he could tell of it, Rico was in the middle stages of the decay. Still fairly high functioning in that she hadn't lost language recognition yet, but her motor control was on the way out and her short term memory was pretty much shot to hell. If this was going to be anything like Angelica, that gave her anywhere from a week to a month.

A month to sit around and see how long she could still twiddle her thumbs.

"Umm, sir?" Rico tentatively tested another two pieces of robin-egg sky together.

"Mmm?" He grunted and raised up a fraction on his elbow.

"When do we get back to work?"

Jean felt his jaw hardening and fought to keep the surface passive. His immediate boot camp response would have been a swift disciplinary slap and a demand she keep better track going forward. Sure, it wasn't her fault she didn't remember, but it would give him a moment's satisfaction of actually _doing_ something about it.

On the other hand, he had just spent the better part of the last year putting ghosts to rest. He would be doing himself no favors planting a new one now.

"We're not going back," he muttered. If she had just followed orders, they wouldn't have to live in this empty limbo. He'd been ready—no, _wanting—_to die with Dante at the end of the conflict. If Rico had shot through his center of mass when he told her, she would have still completed the mission. Then he wouldn't have to deal with any of this.

But she hadn't. When he ordered her to take the shot, she fired through his flank. It still crippled Dante and resulted in a successful capture, but it hadn't ended things for Jean. He should have been happy that they got the terrorist mastermind; it was more than he could have managed on his own. But then there was this: the life after with nothing left to live for.

"Oh." Rico's expression faltered for a moment as her hands drifted back towards the table. "Is it something I did?"

Jean forced himself to look at her. She kept coming back to that question. Whether she was doing that on purpose or was legitimately forgetting, he couldn't tell.

"No," he said. "We did what we were supposed to." She had held up her end of the contract. This was just the disappointing part of reality where she found out he couldn't hold up his.

No matter what they did, her body would eventually stop working.

Something flickered across her face as her cheeks twitched. He couldn't tell if it was her catching on or just shock. The Conditioning would keep her from snapping at him. Even if he had lied to her, there wasn't really anything she would do about it. Besides, he could make up that difference all on his own.

"Sir?" Her voice sounded like someone had caught her by the throat, but her expression mirrored his own outward stoicism.

"What is it?"

"You look… upset."

Jean felt the beginnings of a sarcastic laugh try to escape his mouth before he smothered it. "I'm fine." he told her.

And that would be the end of that. Hiccups in the Conditioning meant Rico tried to look out for him beyond just his physical well being, but she still wouldn't actively disagree with him. She _couldn't_. She would just have to take him at his word and leave him in whatever self-inflicted agony he'd dredged up.

Looking back to his reports, Jean took a deep breath and fought down a scowl. He'd have to talk to whoever was in charge of the mix later. Bianchi had said something about the rehab dose including anti-depressants. If they couldn't make Rico's last days meaningful, they could at least make them painless.

_What are we even doing?_ Jean narrowed his eyes at the page. He couldn't keep the deal of a working body, not meaningfully anyway. They could outfit her with the latest tech in limbs, but the operation would only exacerbate the stress on her brain. Whatever control she had now, whatever _meaning_ she felt being free from a hospital bed, she would have to enjoy it while it lasted.

Turning the papers face down, he stood up from the bench.

Rico's eyes were on him the moment he moved. "Sir?"

"Come on," he visually traced a route through the messhall while he removed his jacket. "Let's take a lap."

He heard the soft clatter of jigsaw pieces and the groan of dragging metal as she scrambled over her bench. "S-sir! Doctor Bianchi said—"

"I don't care."

It was a dutiful protest. She gave it up the moment he gave her the go ahead. She didn't actually want to sit there doing a puzzle, she wanted to run. Freed from the obligation, she gave an affirming hum and started going. A moment later and she had passed him.

Jean set his eyes forward and focused on his breathing. It felt good to clear his mind and just do something with her. She was faster, naturally, but it wasn't a race. In fact, she didn't even need him to run with her. He was doing this as much for his sake as hers. Just one lap around the messhall to get the blood moving again before he settled in with the reports.

He stopped short a few second later as she went down rounding the corner, a smile slowly slipping off her face.

{§}

"She'll be able to walk," Doctor Bergonzi said, frowning at his clipboard as he paced in front of Jean. The whole rest of the day shot on emergency testing and _that _was the verdict. "All her limbs are in working order. It's probably a motor coordination issue."

"Hmph," Jean pressed his mouth into a thin line. Rico was waiting for him in the examination room next door, but if the doc was just going to vaguely finger the issue he didn't see why they couldn't do it in front of her. "What do you mean 'Probably'?"

Bergonzi shot him an annoyed look that glanced off like a pebble hitting chrome. "I'm head of cybernetic engineering," the doctor muttered, "According to _those_ parameters, she's fine. If you want a brain map, you'll have to wait until I get a reading back from Marianna. I would call Belisario, but we both know he's a little tied up right now."

"Do you have the scans?"

"Why, so you can tell me what's wrong?" Bergonzi guffawed. "Look, it doesn't take a genius to tell she's getting worse, but if you want an actual diagnosis based on which sections are going dark, we'll need to wait for—"

"All I'm looking for is rate of decay," Jean cut in. "How long do I have?"

Bergonzi stopped and lowered his clipboard. "Do _you_ have?" Jean stared back while Bergonzi went on. "What does that matter? She's a cyborg, right? A hunting dog without a hunt. Isn't that how you always talked about them?"

"How long?"

Bergonzi glared into his eyes a few seconds longer, as if trying to press an admission to his point. Like most people who tried to stare down Jean Croce, however, he folded first.

"...I'll look into it," the doctor sighed, waving Jean off with his clipboard. "But if you came to make your peace, now's the time. Do what you need to. If you want my opinion, though..."

Jean felt something in his chest tightening, as if he were submerged underwater and his lungs were starting to give. Restraining himself from looking at the ceiling, he continued to watch Bergonzi.

"Go on."

Bergonzi grimaced as his shoulders rose with a bracing breath. "The earlier we end it, the better," he said. "There's nothing left for her here."

Jean waited. Bergonzi held on for a few moments more as if he wanted Jean to verbally acknowledge the recommendation before simply nodding and turning away. Naturally, he didn't seem particularly at peace with the idea, but that wasn't the reason Jean wasn't taking it seriously.

Following Bergonzi into the next room, he found Rico sitting on the examination table, dangling her legs over the edge. "Rico," he locked eyes with her and nodded towards the door. "Let's go."

Rico beamed and slid off the table. She wobbled a little as she landed, but regained her balance enough to walk on her own. Satisfied, Jean turned to leave.

"Take care of yourself, Rico," Bergonzi called after her.

"I will, thanks!" She waved over her shoulder as she left, coming alongside Jean.

They moved in silence, leaving the doctors block and moving into one of the joining corridors lined with windows. Ahead of them was a stairwell leading down into the cabins and just beyond that a door leading out onto the deck.

Outside, the day had mostly worn itself out into a molten dusk, with the last rays of golden sun breaking through wisps of spent rain clouds.

"Rico," Jean said quietly, watching the scene out of his periphery. "are you tired?"

"No sir, not really."

"Bergonzi can really be a blowhard, huh?"

"I guess so."

"...There's something I should ask you."

"Yes, sir?"

He stopped. He knew what he wanted to ask, but he also knew she wouldn't be able to answer it for him. The old wound in his side from where she'd shot him throbbed and he subconsciously listed to the side.

Rico silently moved to support him.

He took a breath, imagining the words as he hobbled forward. _Why did you tell me to live?_ _After Dante died, why did you tell me to hold on?_

_What am I still here for?_

Pausing at the stairwell, he looked one more time out the windows and took a ragged breath. It would be dark and cold soon, but there was still a little sunlight. Slowly, he turned again and opened the door to the deck. He swallowed.

"Walk with me."

"Yes sir."


	4. Cunctation

**Cunctation**

White stones filled the courtyard like rotten giant's teeth, poking up in uneven rows and spilling into the next courtyard over. And the one beyond that, and the one beyond that. Some shaped like crosses, some carved like angels. So packed and plentiful, it was a wonder they had any room left for the living.

Maybe it was his imagination, but it seemed like they'd added more since the last time he was here.

"Jean?" Rico spoke up, perched on a headstone behind him. She'd been in and out of his vision since they'd arrived, off exploring on her own. Usually he told her to wait at the car, but it felt important to let her in just once.

That didn't change his priorities, though. He kept his eyes on the headstone in front of him.

"Jean," his cyborg persisted, "I have to leave soon."

"We're not leaving until I say so."

"Well… you're not," she allowed, softly thumping her heels on whoever's gravestone she was currently desecrating. "My parents are waiting up ahead. It's time for me to go with them."

"You're parents are selfish cowards," Jean returned flatly. "They sold you to us."

Rico shrugged. "That contract is about to expire."

She said it so casually, like it was a child's promise. Jean scowled. "Your body won't last without us."

"This was what we decided," she went on, as if she hadn't heard him. "When your work was done, you agreed to give God the leftovers. When I was waiting for you, I saw God come down and shake my old body out, to hang like laundry. My parents said they didn't want it, but God told them it was their responsibility. Do you remember what responsibilities are?"

"Of course I remember," he growled. "I'm your responsibility. I brought you outside of that stifling room they kept you in. _I_ gave you life."

Rico hummed and slipped off the headstone. Gracefully weaving her way down the path towards him, she produced a red string from her pocket and held it up at eye level. "This is my life," she said. Then, moving closer, she took his hand and tied it tight around his finger.

He squinted at it. "...I don't have time for this."

"It's the truth," she shrugged again and headed for the parking lot. Just beyond her, he could see her stupid parents. She started to skip.

"Rico, _don't—_"

Except, it wasn't the miserable couple who had signed her over for her eleventh birthday. Her mother looked more familiar than that. Rounded, expressive Sicilian features framed by raven hair and a gentle smile. Jean paused. He knew that face. She glanced at him and the life in her eyes sent a spike through his heart.

While he stood in front of her grave, his fiance was waiting outside the cemetery.

And yet, she was also Rico's mother, he felt sure of it. He wanted to say something, to just hear her voice again, but she was looking back at Rico again before he could collect himself. Behind her, Rico's father gave Jean a pitying look. His face was set strong and true, noble, even. Tested by the world but not shaken by it. His blue eyes pierced through Jean's like light cutting through shadow.

The red string around Jean's finger began to burn. His throat constricted. He couldn't breathe. Beneath his feet, the world rocked.

Ahead of him, Rico bounded further and further along the warping path until the earth bended then broke beneath her. She tumbled in without crying, face-first into the fissure. Jean stood frozen, unable to move as Rico's parents disappeared behind the peeling stone. Soon enough the hole yawned its way to his feet and he could see inside. Rico and someone else lay at the bottom.

_O what a wretched man am I._

Words formed in his head, but not in his voice. Not like Rico's either. He frowned as the ground he was standing on crumbled, tumbling down with the bones and ash of broken vaults.

_Who will deliver me from this body of death? _

He slid towards Rico. The other person had wrapped themself around her like an infant clinging to its mother. Except, it wasn't a live person, it was a corpse. Lacerations poked bone and oozed dry blood through its pale skin. The spine was broken, more by a distinct impact than a fall if Jean had to guess.

But then, if it wasn't alive, then why was it holding Rico?

_Who will deliver me?_

Jean dove forward. He could see Rico struggling in the hold now. Once close enough, he tried to pry the arms off her by twisting the elbows. No luck.

_Who will deliver—?_

The corpse turned its head and looked at him with dull blue eyes. _His_ blue eyes. Set in a face that wasn't quite his own.

There was also a bit of Sophia.

_Who—?_

The corpse let go of Rico and latched on to him.

{§}

Jean jerked awake to a chorus of hums and beeps. At first he thought it might be for him, that he was again in the hospital bed after Rico shot through him. He tested his lungs, feeling for the ache as his chest expanded. Everything still felt numb.

But Rico would be there. If he could just turn his head, he would see her crying, asking him to live. He knew this part already. He just needed to turn and…

His thoughts ground to a halt as the ceiling came into focus. Bolted metal, not sterile hospital white, stared back at him.

The beeps sounded again.

Easing himself up, he realized he was lying in a cot in a sparsely furnished room. The side closest to him featured a dresser, a desk towards the head of his cot, and a closet with two coats and an instrument case. On the other side…

Jean took a deep breath as the room's actual bed came into view and his memory caught up with the present.

This was Rico's cabin. They'd moved the monitors in yesterday.

Claes sat with her back turned to him, tending to Rico's bed. The wall of monitors sat beside beyond that, dutifully reporting the cyborg's vital signs. It took him a moment to realize there was another sound going on besides their vigil.

"So then, I myself indeed with my mind serve God's law," Claes said, her words finally separating from the monitor drone. She used a tone too even and exact to be conversational, leaning more towards recitation. "But with the flesh, the law of sin."

"Huh. That's funny," Rico's voice came from the other bed. "So what's—?"

She paused. Jean sat up far enough to see Claes had just put a spoonful of stew in Rico's mouth. Half of it dribbled out as she caught sight of him.

"Vaughm!" She smiled and tried to call his name around the utensil. "Uuh we geffa—?"

"Calm down," Claes sighed. "You'll choke."

Giving the older girl an apologetic look, Rico dug the spoon out of her mouth and swallowed. "Sorry," she wiped her face with the back of her arm, smearing a dull greenish trail up her cheek. Before she could start again, though, Claes turned back to Jean.

"So," Claes said, giving him a measuring look, "you're awake."

It wasn't meant to sound accusatory, just stating the facts.

"Jean!" Rico braced back on her arms and leaned to look around the other girl. "Do we get to train today?"

Jean could only stare at her. She could still technically move around, but if the ship didn't rely so heavily on staircases the medical staff would have put her in a wheelchair. She was slipping fast. Whatever gamble Bianchi had been betting on when he gave the year-and-a-half estimate had fallen through hard. If they went out, there was always the chance Rico would fall again, and the conditioning cost of repairs made those a non-option at this point.

That risk only became more untenable once he took her memory into account. Whether they did anything or not, she wouldn't know the difference in a few days.

"You should go," Claes seconded, slipping off her stool and taking her soup bowl towards the door. "There's still a little time."

Jean scowled. "Time for what?"

"For you," the dark-haired girl said simply, a carefree note slipping in at the end. "That's what she wants, anyway."

"Yeah?" Jean gave her a shrewd look. For all Rico's conditioning cared, maybe it was what she wanted. It was the same conditioning that had saved him and condemned her. Who cared about any of that anymore? If he would be the only one remembering anyway, he'd rather not fill the space chasing programmed desires.

"It's why she stopped taking the pills."

"...What?"

"She was afraid she would forget you," Claes went on. "She started to forget things when you were gone, and she was afraid you would be next."

"That's—"

He wanted to say 'preposterous'. He wanted to call the whole thing stupid. The conditioning wouldn't take him out of her life; it was probably the only thing binding them together at this point. Why else would she hold onto him? After everything he had put her through…

But then, he hadn't asked for Rico's conditioning to be centered on him. He had asked for it to center on her promised reward: her body. She didn't need people. She didn't need anyone. As long as it was just her conditioning, she would be his ideal soldier. No connections, all drive.

So if Claes was right, she had chosen him instead. It wasn't her body anymore, he was the thread keeping her here.

"Come on," he said at last.

Rico clumsily swung her legs over the side and stumbled to her feet. He would probably end up carrying her by the end of the day. It had been a terribly ignorant choice on her part. There was so much more she could have done with a working body than a connection to a hollowed out shell of a man.

All the same, her hands felt warm as she grabbed his for balance.

"Let's go get you cleaned up."


	5. Caducity

**Caducity**

"Sit up."

Rico scooted up on her elbows, then took a breath and leveraged her torso.

"Look at me."

She turned with effort, swaying for balance like a snake following a charmer, eyes drifting in and out of focus. When she finished, she locked onto his face again and smiled.

He spared her from a half-hearted mirroring of the expression. "How are you feeling?"

"Good," a long beat as she waited for him to continue the routine. Then, when he didn't, "We haven't taken any of my prescriptions yet. Am I getting better?"

"...Can you tell me about your family?"

She nodded as her eyes drifted away. "I can try. They don't tell me everything."

"Alright… let's start with your father, then. What does he do?"

"He works for the city's water department. I don't think he likes his job, but it's all he really talks to me about. He gets his orders from the government and says they're all idiots. Do you work for the idiots, too?"

"Maybe." Fairer to say he was one of the idiots himself, but telling her so wouldn't help anything. "And your mother?"

Her face squinched with concentration and she did a slow sweep of the surroundings. "She's… around. I think her job is to watch me, or to help the doctors, maybe."

"Hmph." Well that was _one_ way of putting the rumors he had heard about the woman. "Anyone else?"

"Well…" her shoulders bunched, then drooped. "Not that I can remember."

"...I see." Technically that was all that was on her file. All that she would know about, anyway. He heard her parents actually tried to reconcile once she was out of the picture. It still fell through, but she'd gotten a healthy younger brother out of it.

Not that she would know the difference.

"Sorry," she gave him a sad smile. "I… I should know more than this, huh?"

"You're doing fine," he said, more because it sounded like something Bianchi would say than anything else. His bedside tone could probably use work, but at least the words were right.

She nodded once and gave him an earnest look. "What about you?"

"Mmm?"

"Your family, I mean," she corrected herself. "Are you married?"

He looked towards her cabin's porthole. Here they went again. "...No."

"Oh," she seemed to almost lose her conversational balance for a moment before recovering. "That's okay, though. I think you're pretty handsome, so you'll probably be alright."

He had to wonder whose sick idea of a joke it was to factor physical approval into the conditioning. Probably just certain wires getting crossed by accident, but being unintentional didn't make the effect any less unnerving. Lauro de Sica's autopsy could attest as much.

"Do you have any brothers or sisters?" she went on.

"One of each, yes."

She gave him a sloppy, unintentionally exaggerated nod that plunked her chin down into her collar. Unlike yesterday, she managed to catch herself from pitching forward this time. "That sounds nice," she affirmed. "Are you close with them?"

"They're gone."

"Oh..." she deflated, just as she had for the past two days, before rallying on again. "Is that why you're in the hospital with me?"

He looked back at her. The first time he'd said yes, mostly as a matter of instinct. She was reliving the day they first met, the day he came to recruit her for his revenge. If Sophia hadn't been taken from him, he wouldn't have come. Technically she wasn't wrong.

And yet, every time he reiterated the answer, he felt he was saying it for someone else. For Enrica, for his parents, for Jose. Henrietta, his brother's cyborg, had even slipped her way in there, peripheral as she was to his own life. She was still one of the pieces missing now.

After putting down the ghosts of everyone he should have loved, Rico was all he really had left.

"Yes," he nodded. "I'm here because I lost something."

"Will it get better soon?"

"...I don't think so."

"Huh..." she lapsed back into thoughtful silence, slowly rocking back and forth as she kept herself upright. Her bedside heart rate monitor gave a few agitated, offbeat beeps, before settling back into its rhythm. Maybe she hadn't expected him to be so direct. "I think…" she began as her eyes again lost focus, "I think it's gonna be like that for me, too."

Jean shifted in his seat and let his mouth rest in his knuckles. He hadn't really expected her to keep track of the conversation this long. After the last few days of rapid decline, he'd gotten used to simple subjects and repeating himself every minute or so. Maybe she was coming back a little.

At this point, it was as good a lie as any.

"You know… some days, I think the world is ending," she sighed, curling her knees up into her chest, then spreading them down crossed to keep stability. "It moves funny, like our hospital is trying to tip over, and all the rooms look different now. They pulled back the skin on the walls so it's just the bones underneath."

Jean pressed his mouth into a thin line and kept his metaphorical feet dry as the conversation changed current. Usually she would circle back around at this point, ask him when her parents were coming and ask him why she hadn't taken her prescription yet. Ignoring the fact that he'd never really been one to wax poetic, he at least wanted to see where this went.

"Hey, Mister?" she gave him a tilted look.

"Mmm?"

"Do you think the world is ending?"

He felt the corner of his mouth try and fail to pull upward. "Maybe," he mumbled into his knuckles. He'd heard the heat-death-of-the-universe argument a few times, but mostly ignored it back when he was hunting Dante. For all intents and purposes, he wouldn't care by the time it actually happened.

"If it ends soon… I'm glad I had this day with you."

He stared as she paused for breath. Technically it wasn't a defect in her body, just the coordination from her brain.

"I think… this is the longest I've ever sat up on my own."

"...Do you want it to end?"

"Huh?" She frowned at the question. Not in fear or alarm, but more ordinary consternation, as if he'd only asked her to name a favorite food.

"Do you want the pain to stop?" he asked again. "That's all this world is going to be, you know."

It wouldn't be hard to arrange. Bianchi might protest on principle, but that was beside the point. Even after the emancipation from the agency, the cyborgs had never legally reclaimed their rights. If they boosted her conditioning levels until it shut down her nervous system, she wouldn't even feel it.

Slowly, she shook he head. "I can't go yet."

"Why not?"

"I haven't said goodbye. There's someone who still needs me."

He suppressed an incredulous scowl and settled for narrowing his eyes. "Your parents?"

"My brother."

Jean stopped short, lifting his face from his chin. How did she know about—?

"He looks a lot like you, but he's got this… determination in his eyes. Like, if he says your whole world's gonna change, you know it's true."

Her head lolled as she tried to address him directly again. "Have you met my brother?"

Again, her heart rate jumped a little, possibly in anticipation this time. Jean felt his throat dry up, but he forced the words anyway.

"I don't think so."

"That's…" her heat beat dropped back to a lethargic slog. "...too bad."

"...I'm glad you had him, though."

"Yeah," rallying a little more effort, she gave him a smile. "Me too."


	6. Chiasm

**Chiasm**

Jean wouldn't call his relationship with Doctor Bianchi strained beyond professional pertinence. They had often disagreed on matters concerning the cyborgs' emotional health—namely in that it was a concern at all—and Jean often silently judged the doctor as trying to justify his own employment. Within the context of achieving his revenge, though, those were annoyances Jean was willing to put up with.

As things stood currently, he felt the conversation would go better with a bottle from the galley's reserve. With all the self-restraint he'd been practicing, he'd certainly earned a little indulgence. Pretending to treat the matter democratically, though, he gave Rico a consulting look.

Her eyes stayed half-drawn and vacant, just as they had for the past two days. She hadn't gone totally blind just yet, but she might as well have. In what he hoped for her sake was one of the final stages of brain death, she had lost her cognitive processing, language, and probably whatever was left of motor control.

And yet, she still refused to die.

He scowled back. "I did what I could," he muttered, "I'm here. What are you waiting for?"

Rico's vitals responded with an apathetic trundling of beeps. The doctors had hooked her up to food and water yesterday, but they left her breathing to fend for itself. When she went out, it would be because her body failed. Given how quickly everything else was going, Jean was surprised she still had a pulse.

Behind him, the cabin door whined open, then shut again with a clunk. He glanced at his watch out of habit. He couldn't remember what time he'd set with Bianchi, but his gut told him it was too early.

_Still…_ he looked back up to Rico's paling face and put away his thoughts of thought-dulling drink, _might as well get it over with_.

Behind him, Bianchi let the silence settle in a moment before continuing his approach. "Good morning, Jean," the doctor said quietly, bringing Claes' reading stool to the bedside. "Any change?"

Good, getting right down to business. Jean could work with that. If Bianchi kept on track, maybe he wouldn't even need the drink. "Minor dips in blood pressure, nothing sustained," he reported. "No changes in heart rate or brain activity, either."

"I see..." A soft, annoyingly uncommunicative frown formed on the doctor's face as he pulled a clipboard from under his arm and began filling boxes.

Jean raised an eyebrow. "And?"

Bianchi glanced up, then back to his clipboard. "And that puts us at a stalemate. Without any new information, I can't form a new prognosis. There's only so much I can do for her in this state."

"And if she goes lucid again?"

Bianchi's frown deepened, "That's more in the realm of medical miracle, Jean, and not a minor one."

"Angelica came back."

"Well… yes, but that was also a miracle. According to Belisario's brain scans, she shouldn't have even been cognizant, much less conscious."

"It happened for them," Jean insisted, reaching into his pocket for a lighter. If he couldn't have a drink, he could at least have a cigarette. Not like Rico would object. "It can happen for us. That's the point of you scientists, right?"

"I... wouldn't call this a matter of science."

Jean grunted and almost started up his nicotine treat when he caught a sharp glance from the doctor. "Fine," he lowered the lighter, then grabbed the cigarette out of his mouth, "What would you call it?"

Bianchi paused."If there's any hope for you," he said, drawing himself back up in his chair, "it's in her spirit."

A dry, humorless chuckle spread his mouth in a make-believe smile. "You're saying I should call a priest?"

"I'm saying any response now is outside of empirical cause and effect," Bianchi sighed. "Perhaps we'll boil it down to a reliable scientific formula one day, but for now the incredible force we call 'spirit' works on its own mysteries."

"Huh..." Jean bobbed his head and almost took a drag from his still-unlit cigarette. Catching himself, he settled for flicking non-existent ash off the end. "So what does her 'spirit' want?"

"Peace, probably," Bianchi returned, lifting a sheet on his clipboard to read a buried page, "or perhaps she's waiting for something from you."

Jean narrowed his eyes in an unamused look. If the joke was supposed to be that he wasn't sitting close enough to the bed, then the universe had a poor sense of humor. He had kept dry, unlit, and present for the past three weeks. What else did she want out of him, a hug?

"It's also possible she feels some kind of responsibility," Bianchi went on. "The bond between Handler and Cyborg runs deeper than just the conditioning, and cases like this are usually sustained purely on force of will. Perhaps she's waiting until she knows your own heart is settled."

"And how will she know when that is?"

"Well..." Bianchi stopped again. Jean watched a series of suggestions struggle and die across the doctor's face. "It's... difficult to say at this point," he said at last. "But if she can sense unrest, theoretically she'll also sense peace. Beyond that..."

"...Beyond that?"

The doctor sighed and showed Jean open palms. "In dreams... there is also truth."

He murmured the words with all the confidence of a schoolboy asked to repeat himself. Jean stared for a moment, waiting for some kind of amendment to the ridiculous statement, before looking back again to Rico. Her empty eyes were still open, looking for God-only-knew-what. If this was really the best they could give her, then maybe it was better she couldn't hear them.

Putting the cigarette back in his mouth, Jean got up and walked past Bianchi.

"Jean?" the Doctor called after him with an apprehensive pinch in his voice.

"I'll be back," Jean said, again producing his lighter. "Just going to get a drink."

Dreams or peace or whatever it was she wanted out of him, it would be easier to pretend with a little alcohol in him.

And if she passed before that, at least he wouldn't feel it.

**[To be Continued]**

Author's Note:

Here ends the first half of Contract Closure. We'll finish up during next year's Shibuya Operation Story Storm but we're all out of time for this season. Can't rush with a story like this, you know? Gotta go for the slow burn. Or perhaps I'm simply using kinder words for the limits of my skill…

That said, thank you for reading this far! I pray I have not tested your patience too much and that this slow unraveling of Jean does not feel too redundant to his canon ending. While Mr. Aida does strike a peaceful, respectful tone with his own handling of the subject, I wanted to do something that examined the more long-suffering aspects of a drug-induced brain death and force Jean into a position where all he can ultimately do is watch. When the only thing his relationship with Rico has left to offer is a shared suffering, how long does he stick around? It's that kind of question that I wanted to poke at.

To be completely transparent, though, Contract Closure is also meant as an homage to the Gunslinger Girl writers I consider my greatest influences: Taerkitty and TheScarredMan. Borrowing heavily from taerkitty's structural style and TSM's interpretations of Jean and Rico (along with certain themes for Season 2), my greatest hope for this work is that it will in some way please those who gave me their time, their genius, and their refining encouragement over the years. Thank you for the lessons, I'll try not to waste them on sentimental nonsense.

Until next time,

-CG [MARCH-8-2020]


End file.
